Deuteronomy chapter 30, and let's
read the first 10 verses. Deuteronomy chapter 30 and verse
1. And it shall come to pass, it
shall come to pass. Seems like an absolute prediction,
doesn't it? Absolute prophecy. It shall come
to pass when all of these things, what you and I have been studying
about, the blessing and the cursing, in chapter 28 and 29. When all
these things are come upon thee as a nation, the blessing and
the curse which I have set before thee, and thou shalt call them
to mind among all the nations, whether the Lord thy God hath
driven thee, and shalt return unto the Lord thy God, and shalt
obey his voice according to all that I command thee this day,
thou and thy children with all thine heart and with all thy
that then the Lord thy God will turn thy captivity, and have
compassioneth on thee, and will return and gather thee from all
the nations, whither the Lord thy God hath scattered thee.
If any of thine be driven out unto the outmost part of heaven,
from thence will the Lord thy God gather thee, and from thence
will he fetch you. And the Lord your God will bring
thee again unto the land which thy fathers possessed, and thou
shalt possess it, and he will do thee good, and multiply thee
above thy father. And the Lord thy God will circumcise
thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy
God with all your heart, with all your soul, that thou mayest
live. And the Lord thy God will put
all these curses upon thy enemies, and on them that hate thee, which
persecuted thee. And thou shalt return, and obey
the voice of the Lord, and do all his commandments, which I
command thee this day. And the Lord thy God will make
thee plenteous in every work of your hand, and the fruit of
your body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and the fruit of
your land, for good. for the Lord will again rejoice
over thee for good as he rejoiced over thy fathers. If thou shalt
hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God to keep his commandments
and his statutes which are written in this book of the law, and
if thou turn unto the Lord thy God with all thine heart and
with all thine soul." It seems to me, and you probably I think the same thing. When
I read that, it seems like it is a prediction to the nation
of Israel itself, maybe them in particular, maybe them alone.
When I look at these verses like 1 through 10 and I apply them,
when I apply them strictly to the nation of Israel, there is
very little that I understand about this. I am very weak. when
it comes to prophecy about the nation of Israel, even here which
seems to be so plain. This prediction in verses one
through ten, when I look at them, I see them from here on as coming
true in regards to that nation, how they affected this nation.
It reaches from their first captivity, at least from their first captivity,
with Syria, the Assyrians, the Assyrians took them captive,
Babylon took them captive. So this prediction, it shall
come to pass, reaches probably and at least from that first
captivity all the way to this present time. Now let me tell
you what little bit I know, this is my understanding of how I
would go about interpreting verses 1 through verse 10, this prophecy. It was fulfilled in this nation
and upon this nation at different times and in different degrees
and in different ways. Israel, because of rebellion,
was in captivity different times in her existence as a nation. Remember, Assyrians took them
captive, Babylon took them captive, and then the Medes and the Persians
had taken them captive. And all of those times, the Bible
says that they repented and returned. They built the temple and they
built the wall and then they restored the priesthood and all
the sacrifices and then they worshiped God. The nation as
a whole, though, never did return, did it? If you read the prophecies
of when they returned, it was always a remnant that returned
during of Rubebel, during Nehemiah, during Ezra, a remnant returned. Many of them and maybe most of
them that was held captive by those nations, they stayed in
those nations. They never did come back out.
You see this in Acts chapter 2 when the Holy Spirit had come
and Peter was preaching the gospel to them. There was at least 16
different nations there that day that had come there to Jerusalem
at the Feast of Worship, the Feast of Pentecost. And particularly
you'll notice two of the countries that they were from, two of the
languages that they speak, one was the Medes, And one was in
Mesopotamia. Now, Mesopotamia is where old
Babylon was. Many of them had stayed there.
Their parents, their grandparents, they lived there. They raised
the family. They got settled down. And they
came back on occasions to these feasts. But when they were in
captivity and came to themselves in return, it was a small remnant. It wasn't all of them. And this
prophecy applied all through the Old Testament. In the New
Testament, in the Gospel times concerning the Jewish people,
this prophecy also applied. But in the New Testament, things
have changed. We see a change come in the New
Testament. It's no more about the physical
land, but strictly, in the New Testament, it's about repentance
towards God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. When you come
to the Old Testament, they always got out of their captivity and
returned to Jerusalem. They returned to their homeland,
to the land of Canaan. But that never happened in the
New Testament, did it? They seemed to leave the physical
and to concentrate entirely upon the spiritual. They did turn. They sought the Lord with all
their hearts, but they left the physical. They thought no more
about the land of Canaan, the old land. As a matter of fact,
you'll notice they left the land of Canaan. In the New Testament,
when they were persecuted and put out of the temple, persecuted
in the synagogues, remember what they finally did? They left,
didn't they? They went into other lands in
Asia and other places. In the Old Testament, it involved
two things. and they're being delivered from
captivity. It involved the physical and it involved the spiritual.
It involved the physical because they went back to the land. That's
what He tells them here in our text. I'll restore you to the
land. I'm going to bless the land.
And they'd always restore the priesthood and begin to offer
offerings and things like that. But in the New Testament, this
changed. The priesthood of Aaron was dropped
and it was changed for the priesthood of Christ. Remember we saw that
Sunday? I think it was Sunday morning?
The priesthood being changed? There was change made also a
necessity of the law. That whole system changed, didn't
it? And A.D. 70, it was lost altogether. All the physical, they lost the
temple, they lost their priesthood, they even lost their land. They
were scattered out all over the world at that time. But in the
New Testament, it changed from the physical altogether to the
spiritual. In A.D. 70, the nation was scattered
and the whole ceremony along the priesthood was lost. And
the very fact that the early church was ran out of the temple
and persecuted in the synagogue let us know Things have changed. Things have changed. And he hints
at it here in our text. Look at verse 6. He gives us
two hints here that it was going to the spiritual. Circumcision
in the flesh was going to be changed for circumcision in the
heart. See what he says in verse 6?
And the Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of
thy seed To love the Lord your God with all your heart, with
all your soul, that thou mayest live. What about physical circumcision? It was done away with. It was
for a time. It was done away with. If they
came back in the Old Testament, yes, it meant something. But
now it means nothing. So a circumcision of the heart
and of the spirit. And here in verse 11 through
verse 14 that we'll look at just a little bit later, he talks
about the righteousness of faith, imputed righteousness. And Paul
quotes this in Romans chapter 10. So he gives two hints here
that things are going to change. Yes, in the Old Testament, when
you stray and you're taken captive, You're going to come back to
this land. I'm going to bless you again in this land. You're
going to set up the ceremonial law and offer sacrifices. But
now it begins to change. It's fulfilled to a greater degree
even upon the Jew. And the Lord Jesus told that
Samaritan woman this, didn't He? See, He said, Woman, believe
Me, the time is coming, and even now is, when you shall neither
in this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father. They that
worship God must worship Him in spirit and in truth. So here's what's happening today.
The Jew, I'm talking about the natural Jew, the Jew that's born
wherever he's born, all over this world, this still is being
fulfilled when he comes to himself. No matter if he's in Russia or
the United States or Mexico or Canada or France, wherever he
is, when he comes to himself and realizes he's a lawbreaker,
that he's a sinner, and he hears the gospel and believes it, then
he doesn't go back to Israel, does he? He doesn't go back to
the ceremonial law. That's impossible. That's past. It's decayed and waxed old. But
this part of this prophecy concerning Him is still fulfilled. He comes
to Himself. He seeks the Lord. And the Lord
circumcised His heart for Him to know the Lord Jesus Christ
and love Him. That still happens today, doesn't
it? So it's changed, but it's still the fulfilling of this
prophecy concerning the nation of Israel. Many believe that
in the latter times, sometime on in the future, the nation
of Israel will be saved to a great host of them. It's going to be
saved. That God's going to turn back to them and regather them
and save them or save them and regather them. And they go to
Acts chapter 1 where He said, the disciples asked the Lord,
Will Thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? And he
said, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which
God has put in His own power. He seems to imply that there
is a future glory for the children of Israel in restoring them to
the kingdom. And then in chapter 11 of Romans,
Paul makes this statement, When the fullness of Gentiles come
in, blindness in part as happened to Israel, until the fullness
of the Gentiles be come in. I lean that way a little bit
myself. But I think I lean that way because
I hope that's what's going to happen. And I think all of us
would desire to see that nation brought to the Lord Jesus Christ
and saved. But I think maybe it's more of
a hope on my part than it is a spiritual understanding of
the Scripture. Because the Lord, if He is here today and I ask
Him, Lord, what's going to happen? He would probably tell me, Bruce,
it's not for you to know. And up until now, it's not for
me to know. And I ain't no sense in me lying
about it. I just don't know. But I think, I hope, that even
this passage here is still to a greater part to be fulfilled
upon this nation. upon the Jewish people that one
day a great number of them, a host of them, is going to come to
themselves, and they're going to hear the gospel, and they're
going to weep over Him that their forefathers crucified, and He's
going to save them and circumcise their heart. Now I hope that's
so, but that's the way I just give you my own opinion of how
I interpret chapter 30 and verses 1 through verse 10. Let me go
ahead while we're here and say this. There are some in our day
who say that almost the entirety of the Old Testament scriptures
are to the Jewish nation. And when you come to the New
Testament, they say that all the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke,
and John, are for the Jews. And the epistles of John and
the epistles of Peter and the epistles of James are for the
Jews. They're not for the church at all. Now, it's the two Gospels
theory, and you may have never heard about it. I know Larry
Baker's heard about it. Many of them have talked about it.
But this is such a dangerous thing, and this is growing by
leaps and bounds, that nothing in the Old Testament is for the
church, for the church of the Gentiles. As a matter of fact,
they say there's two churches. There's one church of the Gentiles
and one church for the Jews. That there's two Gospels. Peter
preached a Gospel and Paul preached another Gospel. And I wouldn't
even bring this up, but I'm telling you what, this is growing in
our country. Millions of people across this
country ascribe to this view. And they say the reason that
they believe that, that Paul had this revelation. It was a
new revelation. that had never been written about
before, and it concerns the church. And Paul is the apostle to the
Gentiles, and he only preached or wrote to the Gentiles. And
all the other scriptures is not for the church. Now, that's not
only dangerous, that's heresy. There is but one way of salvation. I don't care if it's in the New
Testament or Old Testament. There is but one Gospel. There
is but one Savior. There is but one church. And
to say there's two of any of those is just to not understand
the Scripture. I want to show you a place or
two. Look over in Ephesians chapter 3. I was reading a man just the
other day, and he used this to prove that the church age The
Gentile church age came into being in the Apostle Paul's day,
and it had never been written about before. And nobody speaks
about it but Paul the Apostle. And here's where they say they
get that. Now look here in Ephesians 3,
verses 1-9. For this cause I, Paul the Apostle,
the prisoner of the Lord Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, if you
have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was
given me to you, how that by revelation he made known unto
me the mystery which I wrote before afore in few words, whereby
when you read you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of
Christ. He revealed it to me, that's what he's saying. which
in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is
now revealed." It was made known, as we'll see in a minute, but
not as it is now revealed. I mean, back then, who knew about
it? Not many. The prophets, like
Moses and many of the others, and few of God's children understood
it, but they don't understand it nearly as much as we do in
the New Testament. Because the New Testament reveals
the Old Testament, doesn't it? As it is now revealed unto the
holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit. What is that mystery? Here's one of them. that the
Gentiles should be fellow heirs, and of the same body, and partakers
of His promise in Christ by the gospel. whereof I was made a
minister according to the gift of the grace of God given unto
me by the effectual working of His power. Unto me who am less
than the least of all saints is this grace given, that I might
preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ,
and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery,
which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who
created all things, by Christ Jesus. Now Paul said here this
was a mystery, but he's not saying that it never was written about
before. Look here now, I want you to
turn to a couple more places with me to prove that. Look in
Acts chapter 26 and verse 22. Acts chapter 26 and look in verse
22. I want to go back over to Ephesians again. Look in Acts
chapter 26. Look here in verse 22. Here is where Paul was standing before
Festus. And he said, Having therefore
obtained help of God, I continue unto this day, witnessing, preaching,
testifying, both to small and great, saying none other things,
look at this, than those which the prophets and Moses did say
should come. He preached the same thing Moses
wrote. And what was that? Look in verse
23, that Christ should suffer and that He should be the first
that should raise from the dead, and look at this, and show light
unto the Jews, the people, and to the Gentiles. Moses wrote
of that? Well, yes, he wrote of that.
knew that, didn't he? And Moses wrote of it, and Isaiah
wrote of it, and all the prophets wrote of these times. When Paul
says, by revelation Christ made known to me the mystery, he didn't
mean that this had never been revealed to the prophets in the
Old Testament. The Old Testament is full of
it. Paul meant that Christ, now listen, here is what Paul is
saying. The Lord Jesus Christ has opened my understanding and
reveal to me what the Old Testament taught concerning the church,
the Gentiles and the Jews being made one in Christ. You can't find one place that
I know of where the Apostle Paul ever preached anything that is
not revealed in the Old Testament Scripture. Even when He made
such mysteries, He said, I reveal unto you, I show you a mystery.
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. You know
that can be proved in the Old Testament. We just need eyes
to see it, don't we? You remember when the Lord Jesus
was talking to those on the road to a Mass and their eyes were
holding that they didn't know Him? And then beginning at Moses
and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures
the things concerning Himself. And they said, Did not our hearts
burn within us while He opened to us the Scriptures? What is
a revelation? When the Scriptures opens and
your heart opens and you see it. Opening, opening. And that's what Paul meant when
he says this mystery had been kept a secret. And it had. But I'm telling you, the gospel
is a secret until he opens our understanding, is it not? We
talk all the time about, we didn't see it either. We didn't know
it either. Our minds were blinded. But it
was there all along, wasn't it? And for these guys to say, well,
Moses never talked about the church. Isaiah never talked about
the Gentiles being saved, and Peter never talked about the
church of the Jews and Gentiles being one. Yes, they did. It's all through the Old Testament.
And a man shows his utter ignorance just to read over that, doesn't
he? Look back over here in Ephesians chapter 2, what the Apostle Paul
just had got finished mentioning, and that's why he went into detail
how he knew this, that the Jews and Gentiles was going to be
one. Look in Ephesians chapter 2. He's talking about verse 11 and
12, how you were alienated. You were, without Christ, being
aliens from the commonwealth of Israel. But he said in verse
13, But now, in Christ Jesus, you, you Gentiles, you believing
Gentiles, who sometimes were far off, are made nigh by the
blood of Christ. For He is our peace to us, peace,
who hath made both one. were one. What does that mean?
I mean, there's no confusion about that. If you're one, it
means you're not two or three, you're one. And hath broken down
the middle wall of division that was between the Jew and the Gentiles,
having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments
contained in ordinances, for to make in himself of two one
new man, so make in peace. made peace between us and God,
and between us and believing Jews, and that he might reconcile
both Jew and Gentile unto God in one body, his body, by the
cross, having slain the enmity thereby, and came and preached
peace to you Gentiles, which were afar off, and those Jews
which were nigh. For through Him we both have
access by one Spirit unto the Father. Now therefore you are
no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the
saints and of the household of God." And look at this, you are
built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus
Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone in whom all the building
fitly framed together. groweth unto one holy temple
in the Lord." And this is the mystery, that Jews and Gentiles
are one in the Lord Jesus Christ. And to say that there are two,
and there is a distinct church of the Gentiles and church of
the Jews, that's not so easy. Peter preached the same thing
as Paul did. Look over in 1 Peter chapter
1, and look in verse 12. Verse 9, I Peter 1 verse 9, look
in verse 9. Receiving the end of your faith,
even the salvation of your soul, of which salvation the prophets
have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that
should come unto you. Searching what or what manner
of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify
when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and
the glory that should follow. Unto whom it was revealed that
not unto themselves but unto us they did minister the things
which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the
gospel unto you were the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven."
So when the Apostle Paul went preaching, he preached to the
Jews and he preached to the Gentiles, and it was the same message.
Repentance towards God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Brothers and sisters, what I'm
saying is this. The passage that I read to you
in our text, Deuteronomy chapter 30, verses 1 through 10, if you
apply that to the Jewish nation, and I do, I apply it to them,
but you can't go everywhere in the Old Testament and say this
is not applicable to the Gentiles and to the church, because it
is. The Old Testament is full of
the Gospel, this oneness that we find in the New Testament.
And I've said it before, that if the Lord does turn back to
the nation of Israel, not just the remnant that He's still saving
today, but if He turns back to that nation, He's going to save
them just exactly the way He saved you and the way He saves
me. They'll hear the gospel, and
they'll believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and they'll love Him
and know Him, and when they do, they will be one with the Gentiles. The only way you can divide the
church is this. Part of it is in heaven. That's
the church triumphant. The church militant is here upon
this earth, still in the battle. But they're one in Christ. They're one in Christ. We'll look at this next week. But here in our text, chapter
30 and verse 11, Moses begins here tell about the righteousness
of faith. Moses preached two righteousness. He preached two
ways of righteousness. He preached one by the law, by
keeping the law. Moses describes the righteousness
which is of the law like this. He that doeth these things shall
live in them. But he didn't stop there, did
he? He went on to describe the righteousness which is of faith. And look in chapter 30 again
in Deuteronomy. And let's read this just in closing.
Look here at what Moses said in Deuteronomy 30 and verse 11.
For this is the commandment which I command thee this day. It is not hidden from thee, neither
is it for all. It is not in heaven that thou
shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven and bring it
unto us, that we may hear it and do it? Neither is it beyond
the sea, that thou shouldst say, Who shall go over the sea for
us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? But
the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart,
that thou mayest do it. Who, I wonder, among all the
nation of Israel, understood what this verse meant? I bet
you there are very few of us. Just a remnant understood the
meaning of this verse. And if you and I didn't have
the New Testament, we may not know what it means. But Paul
interpreted this verse for us. And I want us to close by turning
over to Romans 10 and reading this verse. Paul was writing here to the
church, Jews and Gentiles, at Rome. And here in the 10th chapter,
of the book of Romans. Look in verse 5. Well, let's
just go back to verse 1. Look in verse 1. My heart's desire
and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved.
As a nation they are lost, just a remnant saved. For I bear them
record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to
knowledge. For they have been ignorant of
God's righteousness, God's way of righteousness. not his essential
righteousness, but it's the way that he can make sinners righteous.
And they're going about to establish their own righteousness. They've
not submitted themselves into the righteousness of God. For
Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believe it. For Moses describeth the righteousness
which is of the law, that the man which doeth those things
shall live by doing them. Moses said there is a righteousness
of the law if you can perform it perfectly from your birth
to your grave. If you can do it continually,
then you will have a righteousness. There has not been but one man
who had that righteousness, and that is Jesus Christ who fulfilled
the law. Nobody else is able to. And I
tell you, the more you try to do it, the worse off you get,
the more in debt you get. So Moses described that righteousness,
but here now, Paul quotes and he interprets our text for us. Look in verse 6. But the righteousness
which is of faith speaketh on this wise. Say not in your heart. Who shall ascend unto heaven?
Now here is where Paul was allowed to interpret this verse. What
did Moses mean when he said, Who shall ascend unto heaven?
Paul said this is what he meant. That is to bring Christ down
from heaven. Or who shall descend into the
deep, that is, to bring Christ up from the dead? But what saith
it? The word is near thee, even in
thy mouth and in thy heart, that is, the word of faith which we
preach, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus,
and believe in thine heart that God has raised him from the dead,
thou shalt be saved. For with a heart man believeth
unto righteousness, and with a mouth confession is made unto
salvation. For the Scripture says, Every
Jew that believeth on him shall not be ashamed." That's not what
he said, was it? The Scripture says, Whosoever
believeth on him. Moses was writing to whosoever,
wasn't he, that believes in the Lord Jesus Christ. He has this
righteousness. Without moving a muscle, as old
Scott Richardson used to say, but heart, faith in the Son of
God, in His merits and His obedience, they have this righteousness.
And that's what Moses wrote about. Isn't that wonderful? So we're
one with the Jews, aren't we? We are Jews. We're Jews. Well, did I manage to really
confuse you? Bruce, I was cloudy before. It's
really gotten dark in here.